(1) Field of the Invention
This disclosure relates to a liquid crystal display (“LCD”) with a light emitting diode (“LED”) backlight assembly, and more particularly, to the LED backlight assembly having an LED driving board disposed at a lateral part of a bottom container of the LED backlight assembly.
(2) Description of the Related Art
As display devices are used in everyday life, the liquid crystal display (“LCD”) has been gaining in popularity. To display an image, the LCD has both a liquid crystal (“LC”) panel and a backlight assembly The backlight assembly emits light, while the LC panel receives the light from the backlight assembly and displays an image by selectively allowing light from the backlight assembly to pass through the LC panel.
A commercially available light source includes a cold cathode fluorescent lamp (“CCFL”), which has a glass tube and a pair of electrodes at both sides thereof. Another type of light source is a light emitting diode (LED), which has been gaining popularity because the LED is superior to a CCFL in reproducing color and consumes less electricity.
An LED backlight assembly can have a plurality of LEDs mounted on a printed circuit board (“PCB”), hereinafter termed an “LED-PCB”, to give sufficient light to the LC panel. In further detail, on an LED-PCB, one LED is separated from a contiguous LED with a gap which is a function of the luminance of each LED. In the same manner, the LEDs are distributed across the whole LED-PCB. Further, since each LED is electrically driven, an electrical connector, hereinafter an LED-PCB connector, is located beyond an edge LED by a distance longer than a gap between LEDs to give enough luminance at the edge area of the LED-PCB.
In addition, a bottom container with a bottom plane is provided to accommodate the LED-PCB. Specifically, the bottom plane of the bottom container supports the LED-PCB with its inner side whereas an LED driving board is supported by an outer side of the bottom plane. Here, the LED driving board receives a signal from an outer device and exports a transformed signal to the LED-PCB.
The LED driving board is separated from the LED-PCB by the bottom plane of the bottom container and is connected to the LED-PCB by a cable which passes through a through-hole. In further detail, the through-hole is formed at either the bottom plane or a side wall of the bottom container to provide a passage for the cable whose ends are connected to a LED-PCB connector and an LED driving board connector, respectively Thus the LED-PCB connector is located near the side wall of the bottom container so as not to reduce the luminance uniformity; and the LED driving board connector is located on one edge of the LED driving board. Since the LED driving board is fixed on a different side from the LED-PCB, the cable is very lengthy and its connection to both the LED driving board and LED-PCB is very difficult.
Still further, the edge and outwardly located LED-PCB connector makes the backlight assembly and the LCD bulky, especially in a top plan plane view. Here, an additional side mold can be introduced at the inner side of the side wall of the bottom container to hide the connector, however by hiding the structure, the plane of the backlight assembly and the LCD is increased.
Furthermore, since the LED driving board is fixed to the outer surface of the bottom plane, and electrical parts, such as resisters, capacitors and integrated circuits (“ICs”) on the LED driving boards are outwardly extended from the bottom plane, the thickness of the backlight assembly is increased.